In the first written question submitted, a comrade asks whether
it is true that all institutions of administration are to he
transferred to Petrograd. That is inaccurate. The rumour has
arisen from the fact that the Moscow Soviet has had the idea of
transferring non-essential institutions from Moscow to Petrograd
because of the housing shortage in the capital. It appears that
Petrograd can accept up to 10,000 Soviet office workers, who
number 200,000 in Moscow. To study all aspects of the matter, a
committee has been set up, which is now working. Its findings will
be submitted to the Council of People’s Commissars.[2] So you see that this rumour is
inaccurate in some respects.

The second question and the third ask about concessions. You
will allow me to dwell on the subject.

In one of his books, Spargo, the American Socialist, a man who
is something like our Aiexinsky, and has a vindictive hate of the
Bolsheviks, speaks of concessions as proof of the collapse of
communism. Our Mensheviks say the same thing. The challenge has
been made, and we are ready to take it up. Let us consider the
question in terms of the facts. Who has got the worse of it, we or
the European bourgeoisie? For three years they have been
calumniating us, calling us usurpers and bandits; they have had
recourse to all and every means tooverthrow us, but have now had
to confess to failure, which is in itself a victory for us. The
Mensheviks assert that we are pledged to defeating the world
bourgeoisie on our own. We have, however, always said that we are
only a single link in the chain of the world revolution, and have
never set ourselves the aim of achieving victory by our own
means. The world revolution has not yet come about, but then we
have not yet been overcome. While militarism is decaying, we are
growing stronger; not we, but they have had the worse of it.

They now want to subdue us by means of a treaty. Until the
revolution comes about, bourgeois capital will be useful to
us. How can we speed up the development of our economy whilst we
are an economically weaker country? We can do that with the aid of
bourgeois capital. We now have before us two drafts of
concessions. One of them is for a ten-year concession in
Kamchatka. We were recently visited by an American
multimillionaire, who told us very frankly of the reasons behind
the treaty, viz., that America wants to have a base in Asia in
case of a war against Japan. This multimillionaire said that if we
sold Kamchatka to America, he could promise us such enthusiasm
among the people of the United States that the American Government
would immediately recognise the Soviets of Russia. If we gave them
only the lease, there would be less enthusiasm. He is now on his
way to America, where he will make it known that Soviet Russia is
a far cry from what people believed her to he.

We have till now been more than a match for the world
bourgeoisie, because they are incapable of uniting. The Treaties
of Brest-Litovsk and Versailles[3] have both divided
them. An intense hostility is now developing between America and
Japan. We are making use of this and are offering a lease of
Kamchatka instead of giving it away gratis; after all, Japan has
taken a huge expanse of our territory in the Far East,[4] this by
force of arms. It is far more to our advantage to run no risk,
grant a lease of Kamchatka, and receive part of its products, the
more so for our being unable, in any case, to run or exploit
it. The treaty has not been signed, but it is already being spoken
of in Japan with the utmost anger. Through this treaty we have
aggravated the differences between our enemies.

The second kind of
concession is represented by our granting the lease of several
million dessiatines[a Russian unit of land
measure equal to 2.7 acres.—Editor] of
timberland in Archangel Gubernia which, despite all our efforts,
we cannot fully exploit. We are arranging a kind of checker-board
pattern, with sections of timberland we shall be exploiting
alternating with the leased sections, so that our workers will be
able to learn the use of felling equipment from their
neighbours. All this is very much to our advantage.

And now for the final aspect of the question.

Concessions do not mean peace; they too are a kind of warfare,
only in another form, one that is to our advantage. Previously war
was waged with the aid of tanks, cannon and the like, which
hindered our work; the war will now be conducted on the economic
front. They may perhaps try to restore the freedom to trade, but
they cannot get along without us. Besides, they have to submit to
all our laws, and our workers can learn from them; in case of
war—and we must always be prepared for war against the
bourgeoisie—the property will remain in our hands by virtue
of the laws of war. I repeat: concessions are a continuation of
war on the economic front, but here we do not destroy our
productive forces, but develop them. They will no doubt try to
evade our laws and deceive us, but we have the appropriate bodies
to deal with that, such as the All-Russia Cheka, the Moscow Cheka,
the Gubernia Cheka, and so on, and we are sure that we shall
win.

Eighteen months ago we wanted to sign a peace that would have
given Denikin and Kolchak a vast territory. They turned this down
and in consequence lost everything.,[5] We have napped out
the right road to the world revolution, but this road is not a
straight one, but goes in zigzags. We have weakened the
bourgeoisie, so that it cannot overcome us by force of arms. They
used to ban our conduct of communist propaganda; but there can be
no question of that at present, and it would be ridiculous to
demand such things. They are decaying from within, and that gives
us strength. We do not imagine that we shall defeat the world
bourgeoisie by force of arms alone, and the Mensheviks are wrong
in ascribing that intention to us.

I did not hear Comrade Kamenev’s report on the
Conference, but I shall say that the latter teaches us a lesson:
no matter how the struggle proceeded and whatever memories remain,
we must put a complete end to everything. It should be remembered
that the consolidation of our forces is the main and most
important task. Tasks of economic construction await us. That
transition will be difficult after six years of war, and we have
to tackle the problem with united forces, on the platform of the
All-Russia Conference’s resolutions, which must he carried
out. The struggle against red-tape methods, and economic and
administrative work call for unity. What is expected of us is
propaganda by example; the non-Party masses have to be set an
example. It will be no easy matter to carry out the resolutions,
but we must concentrate all our forces on that task and set about
working in all earnest. I call upon you to do that.

Endnotes

[1]
Held in the Hall of Columns, the House of Trade Unions, on
November 20, 1920, this meeting discussed reports on the Mos cow
Gubernia Conference of the R.C.P.(B.) and the war situation. Lenin
spoke at the meeting in connection with the publicationof the
decree on concessions, on November 25.—Editor

[2]
The Council of People's Commissars, with Lenin as chairman, was
formed by the Second All-Russia Congress of Soviets in October
1917. It was occasionally called the great, or full, Council to
distinguish it from the small, or limited, Council,
whichfunctioned under its auspices from December 1917 to 1926 as
acommission dealing with minor questions and preparing various
questions for consideration by the full Council of
People'sCommissars.—Editor

[3]
The Peace Treaty of Versailles, which concluded the First World
War, was signed on June 28, 1919, by the U.S.A., the British
Empire, France, Italy, Japan and other Allied Powers, on the one
hand, and Germany, on the other. Lenin wrote, "this is an
unparalleled and predatory peace, whichhas made slaves of tens of
millions of people, including the most civilised" (see p. 320 in
this volume). The treaty consolidated the repartition of the
capitalist world in favour of the victors, and established a
system of relationships between countries which was aimed at
strangling Soviet Russia and suppressingthe world revolutionary
movement.—Editor

[4]
The imperialist government of Japan, in collusion with U.S. and
British ruling circles, invaded the Far East in the spring of 1918
in an attempt to seize Soviet territory east of Lake Baikal. On
April 5, Japanese troops landed in Vladivostok. Operating from
their main strategic base in Vladivostok, they occupied the
Maritime Province, Northern Sakhalin and the Trans-Baikal
region. The rout of Keichak at the end of 1919, the growing
guerilla movement and the economic crisis in Japan in 1920-21,
which was aggravated by the Japanese-American contradictions,
spoiled the doom of the interventionists. By the autumn of 1922
their rout was complete and on October 25 the last
interventionistsleft Vladivostok.—Editor